At first it seemed to me that my late friend was indulging in a posthumous joke, and I paid his memory the compliment of seeing the point. But when, some days later, I received a note from his executors stating that they had found in the store-room of Bragdon's house a large packing-box full of papers and books, upon the cover of which was tacked a card bearing my address, I began to wonder whether or not, after all, the imagination of my dead friend had really led him to believe that he possessed literary ability.
I immediately sent word to the executors to have the box forwarded to me by express, and awaited its coming with no little interest, and, it must be confessed, with some anxiety; for I am apt to be depressed by the literary lucubrations of those of my friends who, devoid of the literary quality, do yet persist in writing, and for as long a time as I had known Bragdon I had never experienced through him any sensations save those of exhilaration, and I greatly feared a posthumous breaking of the spell. Poet in feeling as I thought him, I could hardly imagine a poem written by my friend, and while I had little doubt that I could live through the reading of a novel or short prose sketch from his pen, I was apprehensive as to the effect of a possible bit of verse.
It seemed to me, in short, that a poem by Bragdon, while it might easily show the poet's fancy, could not fail to show also the produce-broker's clumsiness of touch. His charm was the spontaneity of his spoken words, his enthusiastic personality disarming all criticism; what the labored productions of his fancy might prove to be, I hardly dared think. It was this dread that induced me, upon receipt of the box, appalling in its bulk and unpleasantly suggestive of the departure to other worlds of the original consignor, since it was long and deep like the outer oaken covering of a casket, to delay opening it for some days; but finally I nerved myself up to the duty that had devolved upon me, and opened the box.
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It was full to overflowing with printed books in fine bindings, short tales in Bragdon's familiar hand in copy-books, manuscripts almost without number, three Russia-leather record-books containing, the title-page told me, that which I most dreaded to find, The Poems of Thomas Bragdon, and dedicated to "His Dearest Friend"—myself. I had no heart to read beyond the dedication that night, but devoted all my time to getting the contents of the box into my library, having done which I felt it absolutely essential to my happiness to put on my coat, and, though the night was stormy, to rush out into the air. I think I should have suffocated in an open field with those literary remains of Thomas Bragdon heaped about me that night.
On my return I went immediately to bed, feeling by no means in the mood to read The Poems of Thomas Bragdon. I tossed about through the night, sleeping little, and in the morning rose up unrefreshed, and set about the examination of the papers and books intrusted to my care by my departed friend. And oh, the stuff I found there! If I was depressed at starting in, I was stupefied when it was all over, for the collection was mystifying to the point that it stunned.
In the first place, on opening Volume I. of the Poems of Thomas Bragdon, the first thing to greet my eyes were these lines:
CONSTANCY
Often have I heard it said
That her lips are ruby-red:
Little heed I what they say,
I have seen as red as they.
Ere she smiled on other men,
Real rubies were they then.
But now her lips are coy and cold;
To mine they ne'er reply;
And yet I cease not to behold
The love-light in her eye:
Her very frowns are fairer far
Than smiles of other maidens are.
As I read I was conscious of having seen the lines somewhere before, and yet I could not place them for the moment. They certainly possessed merit, so much so, in fact, that I marvelled to think of their being Bragdon's. I turned the leaves further and discovered this: